Ingenious Imperial Intelligence Investigation

The Game Of Empire, CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

Magnusson's propaganda:

the Polesotechnic League rescue operation upset the Merseian order of things and the League profited from the Merseians' tragedy (David Falkayn, "Day of Burning");

Terrans and Merseians can make peace and an alliance and expand through the galaxy together;

his own father traded with the Roidhunate and even with its home planet until the Starkad incident caused relations to deteriorate (Dominic Flandry, Ensign Flandry).

In other words, Magnusson has completely swallowed their propaganda. Jonah has swallowed the whale. (In fact, I think that he is showing his hand a bit too openly.)

Magnusson has had regular contact with Merseians in combat, in negotiations and during peaceful interludes. Therefore, either he is invincibly naive about Roidhunate intentions or he shares their aims and is secretly collaborating with them. Dominic Flandry mounts an ingenious Intelligence investigation in order to check on that second possibility:

as a token of good will, Magnusson has proposed negotiations, expecting, at this stage, to be rebuffed;

Flandry argues hard that the invitation be accepted;

the Imperial delegation comprises mostly officials with unreasonable expectations;

however, Flandry accompanies them, expecting to be invited to private discussions with Magnusson;

he tells Magnusson that the Imperium wants to sound him out through the medium of personal conversations with Flandry;

in fact, Flandry asks leading questions, trying to learn the extent of Magnusson's contacts with Merseians and their agents, specifically Aycharaych;

meanwhile, spies are sent to Merseia to seek answers to those same questions;

Flandry and the spies will compare notes - except that the spies have been captured and Magnusson is onto Flandry's game.

Nevertheless, that is an impressive concluding mission for Sir Dominic in the Technic History series.

The Battle At The Red Sun II

Magnusson attacks Sector Aldebaran but which sector had he been the Admiral of?

A concentrated attack might damage a quantum-jumping ship but this is unlikely, apparently. Even when not jumping, a ship is protected by:

armor plating;
absorbers;
computer-controlled negafields.

Two ships are solid and therefore vulnerable to each other either when they are not jumping or when they are in phase. Ships can match phase because any given type of ship has a limited range of feasible frequencies and these are quantized, not infinitely divisible. Shifting frequencies is an evasive tactic. High-speed stochastic analysis can help an enemy to predict upcoming frequencies. Since the object is not only to avoid harm but also to inflict it, phase-change evasion is not always used and two opponents may both go relativistic to settle the matter.

Magnusson's flagship, N. Aquilae, planetoid-sized with a crew of hundreds and machines in their thousands, is at the center of his fleet. The Admiral and his staff are safe behind defensive missiles, projectiles, rays and shielding fields whereas fighting ships are necessarily less well protected.

Magnusson is tactically flexible whereas Rear Admiral Blenkiron of Sector Aldebaran merely holds his armada in standard configuration, hoping to reduce, then englobe, his enemy. However, some ships under Magnusson's command already orbit Battle Sun in relativistic mode with power turned down, additionally hidden by the dust and gas of a potential but unformed planetary system. At Magnusson's signal, the extra ships go hyper, their well-tuned engines protecting most of them from the danger of jumping too close to a star. They attack the Terran armada from all directions while Magnusson's fleet also thrusts through. Blenkiron does not know how to respond but, with his flagship captain's advice, he manages to retreat, preserving most of his ships but letting Magnusson take Sector Aldebaran in a classic victory.

Flandry has been compared to Hornblower. I find another Hornblower parallel in just one aspect of what happens with Blenkiron. In a Hornblower TV episode, young officer Hornblower issues an order. An older, experienced seaman replies, "That would be difficult to do, sir, unless you meant..." and then suggests a completely different order. Hornblower, smiling his thanks, says, "That is what I meant, of course!" The older man helps the younger man. The younger man is wise enough to heed advice and is also able to acknowledge the help non-verbally. No order has been disobeyed and there has been no insubordination. Similarly, although in different circumstances and at a much higher level in terms of rank, the flagship captain, Tetsuo Ogawa, saves the day and becomes a hero by diplomatically advising the panicked, un-Hornblower-like, Blenkiron.

See other battles in space here and here.

A Mask Of Bonhomie

Brechdan Ironrede thinks:

"[Abrams'] aide, Flandry, looked alert; but he was young and very junior." (Chapter Ten, p. 94)
-copied from Quick Learners.

Decades later:

"Flandry was practiced at keeping vigilance behind a mask of bonhomie. Magnusson was not; when he felt such a need, he clamped down a poker face."
-Poul Anderson, The Game Of Empire IN Anderson, Flandry's Legacy (Riverdale, NY, 2012), pp. 189-453 AT CHAPTER EIGHTEEN, pp. 394-395.

Magnusson acknowledges that he has at least heard of Aycharaych. In fact, the Chereionite telepath conditioned him. After a convivial meal, Magnusson discloses that as a child he had accompanied his father on trading trips to Merseia. This is what Flandry is after. When he returns to Terra, he hopes to compare notes with spies who have been to Merseia. Can they compile evidence that Magnusson is working for Merseia? Unfortunately, the spies have been captured, Magnusson recognizes Flandry's leading questions and arrests him. A younger generation will defeat Magnusson.

Introducing Magnusson

The Game of Empire.

""'...we can't do anything about it. Can we?'"

-CHAPTER FOURTEEN, p. 346.

"He drew a long breath. 'Come aside with me and let us talk,' he said."

-CHAPTER FIFTEEN, p. 347.

That was unusual: a question asked at the end of one chapter and answered at the beginning of the next. Usually, a chapter change is a change of scene although sometimes the end of one chapter prepares for the beginning of the next. Thus, in CHAPTER THREE, Targovi quizzes Diana about Olaf Magnusson. What does the public know? What does she know? How does she know it? Targovi has suspicions but wants to check them against the public image. It may be that that image has somehow been manufactured. Magnusson is a hero because he defeated the Merseians but what if the Merseians themselves had contrived to generate the impression of their defeat? Targovi does not voice any of this to Diana but he had been gathering the relevant evidence in CHAPTER TWO. In any case, after all this analysis of Magnusson, CHAPTER FOUR opens:

"The home of Admiral Sir Olaf Magnusson lay in the desirable tract a hundred kilometers north of Aurea."

-CHAPTER FOUR, p. 249.

In other words, having heard several other characters, not just Targovi and Diana, discussing this public figure, Magnusson, we are now about to share the point of view of the guy himself - although it will be a while before Targovi's suspicions are confirmed.

See also Chapter Change. 

All

 

The Game Of Empire, CHAPTER FOUR.

Olaf Magnusson was not:

"...rapt in the contemplation of the All that his Neosufic religion enjoined. He had striven to be, but his thoughts kept drifting elsewhere, until at last he accepted their object as the aspect of the Divine which was set before him tonight." (p. 250)

How can you contemplate the All? Can you strive to? Surely thought always drift elsewhere? In zazen, we contemplate the here and now which includes drifting thoughts. They are not to be suppressed but to be noticed and let go of. (To practice is to persevere, not always to succeed.)

The aspect of the Divine that is set before Magnusson is:

"Strength. Strength unafraid, unhesitant, serving a will which was neither cruel nor kind but which cleanly trod the road to its destiny.... He could not hold the vision before him for very long at a time. It was too superb for mankind." (ibid.)

Indeed. The alert reader remembers Djana's visions on Talwin:

"Before her flashed the image of a Merseian Christ, armed and shining, neither compassionate nor cruel but the Messiah of a new day.... She hadn't heard of any such belief among them. Maybe they had no need of redemption; maybe they were God's chosen...."

-Poul Anderson, A Circus Of Hells IN Anderson, Young Flandry (Riverdale, NY, January 2010), pp. 193-365 AT CHAPTER FOURTEEN, p. 298.

Merseian conditioning had worked on Djana's Catholic upbringing. It went further:

"He on the throne: 'For that they have sinned beyond redemption, the sin that may not be forgiven, which is to blaspheme against the Holy Spirit, no more are they My people.

"'Behold, I cast them from Me; and I will raise against them a new people under a new sun; and their name shall be Strength.

"'Open now the book of the seven thunders."

-A Circus Of Hells, p. 304.

A Third Testament? Does Magnusson's religion come from Sufism or from the Roidhunate?

Finally, after Magnusson's vision of Strength:

"Into his awareness there kept jabbing mere facts, practicalities, things he must do, questions of how to do them - yes, crusades have logistic requirements too -" (ibid.)

Mere facts are what we have to attend to, Magnusson. A pity he mentioned his crusade...

Retro-History

In Ensign Flandry, the Terran Emperor was Georgios. In subsequent volumes, his successors were:

Josip;
unnamed short-live Imperial relative (added, 17 June '14);
Hans;
Dietrich;
Gerhart -

- and Gerhart's heir will be Karl.

In The Game Of Empire, when Olaf Magnusson tries to depose Gerhart, we are given some retroactive history involving four already familiar names:

as Georgios was dying, Josip's favorites gained power;

when Josip succeeded, atrocities became routine in the outer Empire;

Captain Erik Magnusson of Kraken traded with Merseia;

some Merseians sensed Magnusson's disaffection from the Empire and referred his case to Brechdan Ironrede;

Brechdan and human subjects of the Roidhun converted Captain Magnusson;

Magnusson left his son Olaf to be educated on Merseia;

Aycharaych completed Olaf's conditioning.

The Game Of Empire also introduces the Zacharians whose retro-history goes back to the Polesotechnic League period and even further to the earliest interstellar travel of the twenty second century. There is always more to be learned about the past.

Flandry And Others

In four of the Dominic Flandry novels, we see the central character in conversation with each of the four men who try to become Terran Emperor by force. One succeeds. The four are:

McCormac in The Rebel Worlds;
Molitor in A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows;
Cairncross in A Stone In Heaven;
Magnusson in The Game Of Empire.

What looks like casual dinner conversation with Magnusson is, of course, very clever espionage which, in this case, does not succeed, although through no fault of Flandry's.

"Flandry was practiced at keeping vigilance behind a mask of bonhomie. Magnusson was not; when he felt such a need, he clamped down a poker face." (Flandry's Legacy, New York, 2012, pp. 394-395)

There are two other neat touches during this conversation.

"[Flandry's] brand of tobacco had an odor suggesting leaves on fire in a northern Terran autumn." (p. 395)

Of course. How appropriate. Flandry had told us, in an earlier installment of the series, that Manuel's Empire was the Indian Summer of Technic Civilization and that, by Flandry's own time, autumn is far advanced.

When Magnusson is having Flandry arrested, he says:

"'...I now have one more proof that the God looks after His warriors.'" (p. 400)

This is frightening because a human being is suddenly speaking like a Merseian. (Think Doctor Who companion suddenly speaking like a Dalek.) But Magnusson has not, impossibly, changed his species. How he came to be loyal to Merseia, and what role Aycharaych may have played in his conversion, is a fascinating story to be disclosed in a later chapter.

Falkayn And Magnusson

If fictional history is to be authentic, then it must present characters who sometimes express diametrically opposed perceptions and interpretations of a single set of events. Thus, David Falkayn on Polesotechnic League aid to Merseia:

"'We want to save you, because you are sentient beings. But it'll be expensive, and a lot of the work will have to be done by outfits like mine, which exist to make a profit. So, besides a scientific base, we want a reasonable economic return.

"'Eventually, though, we'll depart. What you do then is your own affair. But you'll still have your civilization. You'll also have a great deal of new equipment and new knowledge. I think you're getting a bargain.'"

-Poul Anderson, "Day of Burning" IN Anderson, David Falkayn: Star Trader (Riverdale, NY, March 2010), pp. 209-272 AT p. 221.

Centuries later, Olaf Magnusson on the same issue:

"'...the Terran rescue mission upset [the Merseian's] whole order of things and found ways to get rich off their tragedy-...'"

-The Game of Empire, CHAPTER EIGHTEEN, p. 397.

Thus, according to Magnusson, the Terrans provoked hostility and aggression from the Merseians! Maybe they should not have helped?

Magnusson also informs Flandry that:

"'...the Starkad incident caused relations to deteriorate entirely.'"

-ibid., p. 398.

Flandry and consecutive readers of Anderson's Technic History know what the Merseians attempted at Starkad - more than enough to cause a deterioration in relations. But we need more of this in future histories - not that I am keeping up with any current series, however.

Brechdan Ironrede And Olaf Magnusson

Brechdan stands on the terrace of Castle Dhangodhan. Magnusson stands on the observation deck of his home in the desirable tract north of Aurea on Daedalus.

Brechdan has a scar that throbs on his forehead. Magnusson's left cheek has a battle scar which he has not had removed and which has become his trademark.

Brechdan persuaded Erik Magnusson to serve the God, the Roidhun and the Race and to give them his son, Olaf. The boy was trained in a secret school on Merseia and conditioned by Aycharayach. Thus, Brechdan and Aycharaych wrought long term harm. Tachwyr had succeeded Brechdan and Chereion had been destroyed before Olaf tried to seize the Terran Throne.

Intermissions

The main narrative of Poul Anderson's The Game Of Glory is about the activities of Diana Crowfeather and her two nonhuman companions. Anderson skillfully interrupts this narrative with sometimes shorter chapters presenting a wider perspective -

Chapter Four: 5 pages of dialogue between Magnusson and his wife on the eve of his insurrection;
Chapter Six: 5 pages in which the Merseian Roidhun's Grand Council discusses the news that Magnusson has risen;
Chapter Eight: 10 pages on the two faces of war, the face of technology, organization, strategy, tactics and philosophy and the face that is different for every individual;
Chapter Eleven: 11 pages about a Merseian raid intended to confuse the Terrans;
Chapter Twelve: 9 pages in which Dominic and Miriam Flandry discuss the war;
Chapter Eighteen: 15 pages about a meeting between Magnusson and Flandry;
Chapter Twenty-One: 8 pages summarizing the personal and family history that had led to the Magnusson rebellion;
Chapter Twenty-Two: 6 pages about the aftermath in the Patrician System and on Merseia.

That leaves fifteen chapters for the main narrative which I am currently rereading.

Information Lag And Inference

The Game of Empire, CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO.

Some people do not understand about information lag. They assume that, if an important event has occurred, then everyone simultaneously knows that, why, how etc it has occurred. The event is like a visible object that everyone perceives and from the same angle. No inference or interpretation, let alone ignorance, is involved.

Tachwyr knows that the Terrans have learned that Magnusson was a Merseian agent. He does not know how the Terrans have learned this. Tachwyr infers that, as soon as the news broke, Magnusson's crew mutinied and killed him quickly. He infers that Magnusson's partisans are deserting his cause and that, if they do not surrender immediately, this is only because they are holding out for pardons. Tachwyr's colleagues agree with the inferences while recognizing that they are inferences. 

Other possibilities include Magnusson's arrest, trial, conviction and execution or, alternatively, his escape to Merseia where, according to Tachwyr, he would wind up:

"'...dragging out a useless existence as a pensioner...'" (p. 446)

He would not. Or, at least, he would if he himself saw it that way. As long as a self-conscious being is alive, then he is capable of contemplating and transcending his own past actions. Prisoners make religious conversions maybe because, deprived of everything else, they latch onto an ultimate escapism but it does not have to be that way. As long as they are alive and aware, their existence is not useless unless they think that it is.

The Other Side Of A Coin

Having said all that, in the previous post, we cannot understand an individual unless we understand his or her social context and we cannot understand a society without some kind of theoretical framework. (Are social relationships based on ideas or on economic relationships?) Without first a decadent Terran Empire and second an aggressive Merseian Roidhunate, there would not be an Olaf Magnusson. An Olaf Magnusson clone born and brought up in a completely different society would not grow up to become the Admiral Magnusson that we know and - well, know. If there had not been Galilean missionaries on Woden, then Axor would not have converted to Jerusalem Catholicism and would have had no reason to travel through the galaxy looking for the Universal Incarnation.

I think that we tend to regard individuals and their motivations as givens but, like everything else, they have to have come from somewhere. (And an omnipotent creator could simply not create the conditions that had led to an Admiral Magnusson.) A man told me that he had a right to buy pornography but this entire question could arise only in a society where pornography already existed. The "right," if it is a right, to buy pornography would not have come into existence in a (much healthier) society where no one had ever thought of producing pornography.

A coin has two sides. People make history but not in circumstances of their own choosing.

Some Clues About Magnusson

The Game of Empire, CHAPTER FOUR.

Olaf Magnusson contemplates:

"Strength. Strength unafraid, unhesitant, serving a will which was neither cruel nor kind but which cleanly trod the road to its destiny.... He could not hold the vision before him for very long at a time. It was too superb for mankind." (p. 250)

What race is the vision fit for? And where else have we read about strength neither cruel nor kind? - apart from in the Nietzschean superman?

"Before [Djana] flashed the image of a Merseian Christ, armed and shining, neither compassionate nor cruel but the Messiah of a new day..."

-Poul Anderson, A Circus of Hells IN Anderson, Young Flandry (Riverdale, NY, January 2010), pp. 193-365 AT CHAPTER FOURTEEN, p. 298.

"'...I will raise against them a new people under a new sun; and their name shall be Strength.'"

-ibid., p. 304.

But the truth about Magnusson hits us in the face when he tells Flandry:

"'...I now have one more proof that the God looks after His warriors.'"

-The Game of Empire, CHAPTER EIGHTEEN, p. 400.

What! Magnusson cannot be a disguised Merseian! No. But he can have been indoctrinated by Merseians...

Wind On Imhotep; Breeze On Daedalus

The Game Of Empire.

When Targovi tells Diana that he suspects that Admiral Magnusson plans to rebel, silence falls except for the sounds of wind, sea and ship but we have quoted this passage before. See Wind Boomed.

When Magnusson's wife, Vida, interrupts his meditation:

"He could barely hear her voice through the cold, whittering breeze, as soft as it was." (CHAPTER FOUR, p. 250)

I do not think that we have quoted this sentence before. The coldness of the breeze matches the coldness of Magnusson's response and it is also appropriate that this particular breeze does not soothe but whitters. Magnusson, planning rebellion, has already been distracted from meditation by many logistical details. When there is peace, different winds and breezes will blow. There are glittering snowflakes and scrittling leaves in the Imhotepan autumn in the concluding chapter.

Neosufism

Admiral Sir Olaf Magnusson:

"Nor was he rapt in the contemplation of the All that his Neosufic religion enjoined."
-Poul Anderson, Flandry's Legacy (New York, 2012), p. 250.

Sufism is Muslim mysticism. "Neo-" means "new" which, in practice, can mean almost anything. Traditions can change and even become their opposites.

Apart from this, there is no evidence that Magnusson is a Muslim. However, yogic and meditative practices can indeed be detached from their original contexts, e.g.:

hatha yoga, commonly called "yoga," can be practiced not for meditation but for health;
zazen, just sitting, can be practiced either for relaxation or for meditation but outside a specifically Buddhist context.

Maybe, when Magnusson realizes his oneness with the All, he exclaims, "All, ah!" Despite the humor of this remark, I respect my neighbors' Islam and myself subscribe to the view that each of us is one with the All although apparently separate.

There is a disorienting moment when Magnusson tells Flandry:

"'...I now have one more proof that the God looks after His warriors.'" (p. 400)

A man speaking like a Merseian! Impossible. He cannot be a Merseian disguised as a human being. No, but he was educated on Merseia and hypnotically indoctrinated by no less an agent of the Roidhunate than the cynical Aycharaych.

A single transcendent deity served by warriors - maybe there is some common ground between Muslims and Merseians?

More Complicated Politics

The Game Of Empire, CHAPTER TWELVE.

Olaf Magnusson is the Admiral for an unnamed Imperial Sector that, like the Taurian Sector, is on the marches between the Terran Empire and the Merseian Roidhunate. Magnusson has rebelled and penetrated into Sector Aldebaran. He has the prestige of having defeated the Merseians in a border skirmish and promises to make peace with them when he is Emperor. (He is fluent in Eriau and two other Merseian languages.)

Meanwhile, the Merseians send a "mercy mission" to the Realm of Gorrazan on the opposite side of the Empire. The "mission" allows itself to be seen near Alpha Crucis, thus provoking a clash with Imperial forces. Further, the Merseian attack on Gorrazan does not overthrow the ruling Folkmoot but merely weakens it, thus prolonging the civil conflict between Folkmoot and Liberation Council.

Dominic Flandry analyses this Merseian action. It will cause massive confusion in the Empire. Some will want to watch Gorrazan, which could become a pro-Merseian power at the Empire's back, thus diverting resources from the conflict with Magnusson. Others will say that Merseia is well-intentioned because it supports the progressive Liberation Council. Thus, the Merseians have aided Magnusson's cause. Is more going on behind the scenes?

Magnusson And Flandry II

The Game Of Empire, CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

Dominic Flandry says that lasting peace is impossible between Terrans and Merseians:

"'...unless and until the civilization that dominates them goes under or changes its character completely. The Roidhun could make a personal appearance singing "Jesus loves me" and I'd still want us to keep our warheads armed.'" (p. 396)

I am against the use of warheads on a single planet but how should an interstellar civilization with FTL respond to a threat like the Merseian Roidhunate? What is important here is that, if the Roidhunate did go under or change completely, then Terran Intelligence agents like Flandry would know and would change the advice that they were giving to the Imperial Policy Board.

"Flandry was practiced at keeping vigilance behind a mask of bonhomie." (pp. 394-395)

We have seen Flandry developing such skills since Ensign Flandry.

Magnusson summarizes the history of human-Merseian interactions:

"'...the Terran rescue mission upset their whole order of things and found ways to get rich off their tragedy -..." (p. 397)

(Falkayn.)

"'...the Starkad incident caused relations to deteriorate entirely.'" (p. 398)

(Flandry.)

Both Flandry and Magnusson visited Merseia in their teens and befriended young Merseians but they drew opposite conclusions.

Children Of Empire II

Furthermore, the first Young Flandry novel, Ensign Flandry, mentions Emperor Georgios and introduces Crown Prince Josip. By the time of the third Young Flandry novel, The Rebel Worlds, Josip has succeeded. 

The Game Of Empire introduces the Merseian sleeper agent, Olaf Magnusson, and, in an explanatory chapter, informs us that Olaf's father, Erik, had become disaffected from the Terran Empire during the reigns of the well-meaning Georgios and the corrupt Josip. Brechdan Ironrede, who had appeared in Ensign Flandry, accepted Erik Magnusson's loyalty to the Merseian Roidhunate. Aycharaych, last seen in A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows, conditioned Olaf.

Skilful retcon (retroactive continuity) incorporates a new family, the Magnussons, into the established history. There is a third generation: Vida Lonwe-Magnusson's sons and daughter are with her when she publicly disowns her husband.

Gatto

Please spare a thought for Lieutenant General Cesare Gatto, Imperial Marine Corps. Not the most prominent character in Poul Anderson's Technic Civilization History. Not a name that springs to the lips like van Rijn, Falkayn or Flandry. Nevertheless, Gatto has his role.

When Olaf Magnusson leads his fleet to conquer the Terran Empire, Gatto becomes "...the effective ruler of the Patrician System..." (Flandry's Legacy, New York, 2012, p. 269). Because Diana Crowfeather had traveled with the suspect Targovi and because she is young and female, he personally interrogates Diana. He offers her protection in troubled times and also to take her sightseeing when he has the time. She declines but invests "...half an hour in being charming to the general." (p. 274) Later, bored in her hotel room, she begins to regret her refusal but then gets a better offer.

Much later, Diana and her companions present Gatto with intelligence that makes him change his course. He has to arrest an entire local population that has been covertly supporting Magnusson's rebellion. He asks one of their representatives why they have committed mass treason. He himself has committed treason although not against his species. A week later, he must make a broadcast that ends the rebellion. Magnusson was a tool of the Merseians.

So we should not admire Gatto but should perhaps be glad that he did take decisive action when the damning evidence had been brought to his attention.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

The Game Of Empire, CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

This chapter is:

our second last sight of Dominic Flandry;

our last sight of Flandry working as an Intelligence agent;

the only conversation/confrontation between Flandry and the Imperial pretender, Magnusson;

confirmation that Magnusson is working for the Merseians;

our only sight of the mysterious planet, Sphinx, whose incomprehensible inhabitants pay Imperial tribute but have no other extra-planetary interactions;

our only information about Gwanthyr, a Merseian secret agent whom Flandry had poisoned on a neutral planet;

a temporary defeat for Flandry because Magnusson has him arrested for attempting espionage under cover of a parley under truce;

a chapter of a novel that is part of a long future history series although we are not necessarily aware of that when reading.